Land Rover has confirmed that the hybrid version of its flagship models, Range Rover and Range Rover Sport will be introduced at the 2013 Frankfurt Motor Show, scheduled in September. At the 2013 Geneva Motor Show, Land Rover declared the debut of the hybrid powered Range Rover will happen in 2014. Fortunately, the European buyer will get these eco-friendly monsters before the end of 2013.
The mighty luxury off-roaders will be powered by a diesel-electric powertrain. The 3.0-litre V6 diesel engine synchronized with a 1.7 kWh electric motor will bring down CO2 emissions to 169 g/km from 196 g/km on the current model. The batteries are located underneath the car floor, protected by a boron steel frame which results in no-compromise over the legroom and the seven seater layout inside the cabin of the Sport.
In addition, the SDV8 diesel mill will produce the anticipated power of around 350 BHP and bounty of 700 Nm torque. The speculations have been made that both variants will be mated to the 8-speed ZF automatic transmission that has been employed for the complete range of Range Rover variants.
However, the new models will not be launched in the US because of diesel engine but company officials have confirmed plans to launch a 2.0-litre turbocharged petrol-electric motor for the Range Rover Sport later. The engine is close to Ford’s EcoBoost technology and already working flawlessly on the Evoque and LR2 in the US. The launch of petrol-electric Range Rover Sport is not expected in the near future and will be introduced after the success of the diesel hybrid in the European market.
